Paolo Crippa

The armored units of the Royal Army and the Armistice Paolo Crippa

The Armistice of 8 September 1943 caught the Italian armored units, both Tank units and Cavalry, scattered not only on the national territory, but also abroad. Similar to what had happened to all the Armed Forces, not even they were immune to the storm that had been unleashed and even from these units the reactions to Badoglio's tragic announcement were the most disparate. Through an accurate analysis, in the pages of this book we will analyze how the armored units behaved in those tragic moments, in a synthesis that until now has never been proposed. The units that opposed the attacks brought by the Germans, although in need of armaments, fought for reasons of desperation, in a war that was now lost, and for a touch of military pride. For this reason it is necessary to retrace the events of those days, in order to pay homage to the fallen and to all those who did their duty to the end. This first volume deals, in a particular way, with the events that led to the attempts to defend the city of Rome, where many Italian tank units and Armored Cavalry were, on the eve of the Armistice, almost entirely sacrificed in this desperate attempt, and to the loss of Rome the Italian Capital.